Big noose in Texas this month: The hangingest state in the nation is celebrating 10 executions in 30 days.

Tuesday's lethal injection of Joseph Ray Ries kicked off the bloodfest. Read the Agence France Presse preview.

You'd think that Wall Street's investment bankers and lawyers could use a shot in the arm. If an injection of $700 billion hasn't done the trick, and constant needling by the press seems futile, maybe the only thing left to do is invoke the death penalty.

By coincidence, I just happen to be reading Ronan Bennett's Havoc, in Its Third Year. Because I haven't finished it, I'll let the Washington Post's Carolyn See describe it in her 2004 review:

One more glimpse, this one from Ian Thompson in the Spectator (U.K.):

You'd think that George W. Bush, the hangingest governor in U.S. history, should have read it. But we already know that Bush doesn't read.

And he obviously no longer cares. Returning to the lazy-faire days of its pre-9/11 activities, the Bush administration is focused on shaping its legacy — not to mention the pardons list it's now compiling. But Americans will remember the Bush regime for its mania to control Iraq and its refusal to control Wall Street.

Deregulation, rather than the Bremer Rules, might have worked well as a policy for the former; deregulation is a disaster when applied to the U.S. economy. Unless you think it's a good thing that foreclosure filings have risen 71 percent and that more and more people are losing their jobs.

We should have invaded Wall Street instead of Iraq. But it's the Dow of Bush. Try to stay calm.

By the way, don't watch this morning's webcast of another of the Waxman Committee hearings on the meltdown. Usually it's good entertainment. But today's hearing, "The Role of Federal Regulators," stars Alan Greenspan, SEC Chairman Christopher Cox, and former Treasury Secretary John Snow. You won't see their blood on the floor.

Maybe something else will click . . .

NO PARTICULAR ORDER:

Village Voice: 'Mayor Mugabe: Bloomberg's Velvet Coup' (Tom Robbins)

The Age (Australia): 'US stocks wilt'

McClatchy: 'Florida's GOP lawmakers blamed for early-voting lines'

Register (U.K.): 'Ohio elections website hacked as vote scuffle gets ugly'

CNN Money: '81,312 homes lost to foreclosure in September'

Wall Street Journal: 'Plans to Aid Borrowers Gain Steam'

BBC: ' "US missiles" hit Pakistan school'

N.Y. Post: 'TRAGEDY IN "LENO" CASE: EXEC IN SUIT OVER VINTAGE-CAR DEAL IS FOUND SHOT DEAD'

Register (U.K.): 'Greenpeace on fusion: Whatever it is, we're against it'

Uruknet (Italy): 'Mutant Seeds for Mesopotamia'

Dwell: 'Big Trouble in Little Dubai'

BBC: 'Painfully slow progress in Iraq'

Wall Street Journal: 'Bernanke Endorses Obama'

Raw Story: 'ACLU demands info on domestic military deployments'

Register (U.K.): 'Dutch court convicts teens for stealing pixels'

N.Y. Post: 'CREDIT-RATING ANALYSTS CREATED SUBPRIME MESS'

Washington Post: 'Job Losses Accelerate, Signaling Deeper Distress'

Wall Street Journal: 'Poll Shows Opposition to Gay Marriage Ban'

Scotsman (U.K.): 'We rapped our way to a deal with Sony, our story was fake and accents phony'

N.Y. Times: 'A.I.G. to Suspend Millions in Executive Payouts'

Wall Street Journal: 'Goldman to Cut 10% of Jobs as Downsizing Wave Grows'

McClatchy: 'The Philippines: America's other war on terrorism'

McClatchy: 'Financial panic now sweeping through South America'

Dawn (Pakistan): 'Kabul admits holding talks with Taliban'

IRIN (UN): 'Attacks drive thousands of Christians out of Mosul'

IRIN (UN): 'Medical mission denied entry into Gaza'

Register (U.K.): 'One billion unwanted opinions in real-time: Now SHOUTED at you'

The Senate grabbed hold of the Cash for Crash bill and finally came up with a workable version — one that may work for the Wall Street crapshooters but likely not for the rest of us, who are simply loaded dice in the palms of their hands.

Part of the complex maneuverings supposedly aimed at keeping the country from sliding into Great Depression II revolves around "mark-to-market accounting" of the assets that Wall Streeters have played with to the point of, literally, no return.

Yeah, like you, I have only a hazy understanding of this. Those who are financially alliterate are welcome to read this morning's New York Post story "PIGGY POLS IN HOG HEAVEN WITH PORK-PACKED PACT." Daphne Retter's funny, funky take brings a little light to an otherwise dark day of journalism:

More to the point of your financial future and such no-longer-arcane topics as mark-to-market accounting, lower your eyebrows, peer through this morning's financial fog and try to grab for this guidepost: Bankers and conservative Republicans (including former anti-populace populist Newt Gingrich) favor the abandonment of mark-to-market accounting rules. To which auditors, big investors, and consumer groups reply, "Are you out of your friggin' minds?"

Think of it like the nursery rhyme that goes, "This little piggy went to market . . .", and add some huffing and puffing by wolves that may eventually knock down millions of American homes.

In the present case, these little piggies went to mark-to-market, and now they want to remove that accounting rule so they can instantly wipe out their losses on the books and resume playing their Neverland gambling games with our money.

In essence, the new Senate version of the bailout bill would let Wall Streeters lie even more about the value of the assets they're trading and set us up for a rerun of the Enron scandal.

That should help things.

Or maybe the financial system is so fouled up and so wedded to its inherently corrupt trading instruments and practices that abandoning mark-to-market accounting really would help restart the credit markets and protect you from foreclosure.

Scary.

And where has Wall Street's mayor, Mike Bloomberg, been in all this? I pointed to Bloomberg's culpability on September 23, and now the New York Times is dipping its toe into the topic. The Times, of course, is making excuses for him. See this morning's "Mayor’s Stewardship Is Mixed, Fiscal Experts Say."

Enough on Bloomberg and more on the important mark-to-market piece of the corporate-bailout bill below, but first . . .

NO PARTICULAR ORDER:

Wall Street Journal: 'Fed Considers Rate Cut as Recession Fears Mount'

Slate: 'How to Debate a Girl, and Win' (Dahlia Lithwick)

BBC: 'Tanzania disco stampede kills 19'

N.Y. Times: 'Stopping a Financial Crisis, the Swedish Way'

Jurist: 'Ohio to proceed with absentee voting after courts rule on registration requirements'

N.Y. Times: 'Surveillance of Skype Messages Found in China'

N.Y. Post: 'MOB-CORPSE DIG'

N.Y. Times: 'Studios Sue to Bar a DVD Copying Program'

Wall Street Journal: 'Bombs Hit Shiite Worshippers in Baghdad'

N.Y. Post: 'B'KLYN GIRL, 15, NABBED IN GRISLY DEATH OF COUSIN'

Wall Street Journal: 'Analyzing the "Twelve Tribes of Politics" '

McClatchy: 'What's in that Senate bill? Something for everyone.'

Agence France Presse: 'Enron-era accounting reforms blamed in financial crisis'

Far Eastern Economic Review: 'The Great Crash of China'

Back to the dust-up over the new bailout bill's endorsement, in effect, of abandoning mark-to-market accounting:

Over at consumerwatchdog.com, John R. Simpson issues a fire-and-brimstone warning: "New 'bailout' tactic would let fat cats cook books."

Stirring the pot, today's Wall Street Journal story "Momentum Gathers to Ease Mark-to-Market Accounting Rule" explains things pretty well. Elizabeth Williamson and Kara Scannell craft a succinct lede:

It would just further cloud matters for me to try to paraphrase this, so here's how Williamson and Scannell lay it out:

As Bloomberg's Jesse Westbrook reported Tuesday, conservative Republicans might very well have supported the House version of the bailout bill if the SEC had suspended mark-market accounting rules.

For background, see "Auditors Resist Effort To Change Mark-to-Market," in Tuesday's Wall Street Journal, in which Judith Burns wrote:

Let the staggeringly diverse gaggle of opponents of abandoning mark-to-market accounting speak for themselves. This is what they told the WSJ's Burns and Bloomberg's Westbrook:

Still unclear? In NPR's "Senate OKs Bailout Package, House to Vote Friday," Dina Temple-Raston tries to explain:

That's reassuring that our lawmakers — like pro athletes and philandering pols — want to pull out the hackneyed reasoning to say that all they want to do is get their past mistakes "behind them." In real time, however, the train is still hurtling down the track toward us.

You can't spell "down" without "Dow."

The only good thing about this morning's scheduled meltdown meeting of George W. Bush, Barack Obama, and John McCain is that it confirms that Bush will not be president for much longer — he's actually hosting his successors in the White House.

Otherwise, what the hell are these guys doing? This is not democracy.

Neither Obama nor McCain has won the presidency yet, and Bush is the lame duck. Even if Bush were capable, it's not in our interest for the three of them to reach a consensus unless it's conducted in a democratic process as a publicly hashed-out and argued bit of horse-trading (I'm not talking about a debate). Even then it wouldn't be democratic because we haven't elected any of these three guys to lead the country starting in January 2009.

Besides, you can hardly call this a meeting of the minds if one of the participants is Bush. The mindless, careless, disinterested front man hasn't been running the country — Dick Cheney has, with the help of three guys formerly on our payroll: Karl Rove, Don Rumsfeld, and Paul Wolfowitz.

Democracy is what's going on in Congress right now: messy, contentious, and often ugly, with alliances shifting and factions of Democrats and Republicans forming with each other and dissolving, instead of a strictly bipartisan war in which Republicans march in lockstep at the White House's bidding.

Democracy is also messy, ugly episodes like the Bonus Army, the economy-ravaged, broke World War I vets who camped out in protest in D.C. and clashed with the Army in 1932, during Depression I.

Is a Wall Street Executive Bonus army forming? Or is the government worried about the broke-ass rest of us descending on D.C.? The Register (U.K.) reports this morning, based on an Army Times story: "US Army unit deployed to home front: Nonlethal force for civil unrest." (For background on the grim 1932 clash, see NPR's 2005 video and story "Soldier Against Soldier: The Story of the Bonus Army.")

Still, there may be no need to rush into a massive bailout — as Press Clips reader John McGowan argues in a detailed comment attached to my Tuesday item "Krauts Sour on Wall Street Bailout."

Don't pay much attention to Bush's speech last night. He doesn't know shit about the economy — even with his daddy's help he couldn't make it in the oil bidness, and he became the Texas Rangers' owner without investing hardly any money at all. (The real owners brought him in so they could pimp for a new stadium at public expense, a previous example of his pimping for corporate welfare).

Now, he's performing as the front man for the GOP/Wall Street types who hunger for a quick dose of corporate welfare at our expense through a plan that would throw the rest of us onto the welfare rolls.

Yes, there is definitely pressure on the U.S. from other countries to be quick about a bailout plan ("Overnight Markets," Financial Times).

Although maybe there's not as much pressure from other countries as Hank Paulson and crew would have us believe: See this morning's Washington Post story "U.S. Appeals Abroad Fall Flat as Leaders See No Crisis at Home."

Still, there's no doubt that something does have to be done quickly, but maybe it doesn't have to be an entire, massive bailout right this second. Aren't there more intermediate steps that could calm things down without putting the average American in deeper hock for the unimaginable future?

But in this country, there's always such a rush by lobbyists that all important issues can't be fully hashed out. Remember that during the hubbub leading to the disastrous October 2002 Iraq war resolution, debate was sharply curtailed on the orders of the White House and the GOP leaders who controlled Congress.

And after the unjustified invasion, Democrats like Henry Waxman and Byron Dorgan were prevented from conducting hearings on how the Cheney-Rumsfeld regime was conducting the war. (See my April 2005 item "Fix Your Corrupt Regime" for details.)

Just one of many examples: In February 2005, Waxman pushed for a hearing on allegations of "waste, fraud and abuse in U.S. Government Contracting in Iraq." He was rebuffed and had to hold an unofficial hearing that, even though it revealed fascinating and major corruption including actual bundles of cash, had no official standing and, as a result, garnered little press coverage.

And now there's a real danger of another invasion: the possibility of a GOP-engineered October Surprise involving Pakistan that could scare voters into sticking with the Republicans and electing McCain. Scott Horton laid that out in Harper's the other day.

For guidance, however, look to the markets — the one stock exchange that hasn't yet melted down and isn't asking for a bailout: Intrade Prediction Market, where the current action on John Delaney's sophisticated and clever operation shows that the betting favors Obama.

I wrote about Intrade during the Paul Wolfowitz and Scooter Libby meltdowns, but because our site is screwed up you may not be able to find those items. So here they are:

"Wolfowitz Out? Bet On It." (May 7, 2007)
"Wolfie's Stock Soars" (May 8, 2007)
" 'You're a Criminal!' " (June 6, 2007)

And now here's a collection of today's links from all over . . .

NO PARTICULAR ORDER:

McClatchy: 'Election officials telling college students they can't vote'

BBC: 'US rivals in economy crisis talks'

N.Y. Daily News: 'Naked man falls to his death after Tasered by cops in Brooklyn standoff'

Slate: 'Is Paulson's bailout bill unconstitutional?'

Dawn (Pakistan): 'We’re in a state of war: Asif'

N.Y. Times: 'Bush Aides Linked to Talks on Interrogations'

N.Y. Post: 'WALL STREET WHIZZES LOOK TO HEAD WEST'

BBC: 'What would financial Armageddon look like?'

N.Y. Daily News: 'This loss to Brewers could strand Mets in October'

N.Y. Post: 'PLAY TRIPPER: PAUL'S GAL SKIPS MTA VOTE FOR HIS ISRAEL JAUNT'

BBC: 'Q&A: US $700bn bail-out plan'

BBC: 'Japan offers solution to financial crisis'

Financial Times: 'Bail-out fears hit credit markets'

Financial Times: 'Banking after the bail-out'

Financial Times: 'Bail-out cost ‘impossible’ to estimate'

AME Info (Dubai): 'Jordan poised to enter nuclear age'

Running down the press:

The dolor rose sharply yesterday on desultory, predictable trading of bullshit between Charlie Gibson and Sarah Palin.

As Palin recited her ABC, Hurricane Ike threatened — even the New York Post pushes aside its gossip this morning to warn, "'CERTAIN DEATH': HURRICANE IKE LOOMS AS TEXAS CATASTROPHE."

The news is even worse in the financial world.

You'll be darning your socks if the U.S. economy doesn't stop its slide into a recession and instead falls all the way into a depression.

The best review of that tragedy, which you will forced to take personally, is in today's Wall Street Journal, under the bland headline "Credit Crisis Strains Government's Options."

The story is anything but bland. As Jon Hilsenrath, David Enrich, and David Solomon write:

This is not a reality show we're talking about. This is actuality.

On down in the analysis, the WSJ trio hint of a possible future in which private-equity moneybags will be taking over our banking system and will operate it with even less regulation than now exists. They note that even foreign governments are starting to shy away from plunging their money into faltering U.S. institutions — they're already too heavily invested in them. The story continues:

You think you're in the grip of ruthless bosses now? Just wait.

Post: 'THE CAPED CUSS-ADER: COMIC'S PROFANITY BLUNDER'

Lame head, but the inimitable Darah Gregorian comes through again (this time sharing a byline with Rebecca Rosenberg):

Times: 'In First Big Interview, Palin Says, "I’m Ready" ’

Well, at least this controversy is over. Can there be any doubt now that Sarah Palin is more than qualified to be vice president? After all, she says she is. From Jim Rutenberg's press release:

You want the real scoop-sifting, go to Slate's Jack Shafer, who crafted the best-angled lede:

Laura Meckler's piece in the WSJ is also worth a read.

And McClatchy's Mark Washburn points out that no veep candidate has ever been so carefully shielded by her handlers:

That's almost as scary as the radically inexperienced Palin herself.

Unless you've been raped. Palin's home-state critics, including former governor Tony Knowles, are on the offensive, as McClatchy's George Bryson reports in the Anchorage Daily News:

Post: 'HUNDREDS AT ACS FACE AX'

Douglas Montero's story is a new twist on welfare moms:

Washington Post: 'Palin Links Iraq to Sept. 11 In Talk to Troops in Alaska'

Anne E. Kornblut provides some truly unscripted material on Palin — her piece combines a Palin campaign appearance with the troops with the ABC interview:

Smartly, Kornblut didn't inflict the "I'm ready" bullshit on readers until the ninth graf.

Slate: "80 Over 80: The most powerful octogenarians in America"

Part of a sprawling Geezer Issue. You'll have plenty of time to have someone read it to you before you catch today's early-bird meal.

Running down the press:

Times: 'G.O.P. Tries to Upstage Democrats'

Stop the servers! Atop the front page is this hard-hitting piece by Jim Rutenberg about how the Elephants are breaking "new ground" by trying to trample the Donkeys' un-sexy show. The paper that thinks it's the historical record once again ignores history:

This is not new ground; the paper doesn't even mention that shortly before the 2004 Republican National Convention in NYC, the nation's security guard, Tom Ridge, raised the terror alert level to red in NYC, Newark, and D.C.

As I noted at the time ("The Attack Starts," August 2, 2004), Howard Dean opined a "political motivation for terror alert," as CNN put it, and he was shelled for it.

This morning's story by Rutenberg is a non-story. He quotes GOP political operatives about how pleased they are that their political-operative work is working. And that's it.

On a side note, Ridge's warning actually was prescient: He included a specific note of worry that Citigroup's NYC headquarters could be destroyed. Four years later, Citigroup's subprime performance — massive firings and a stock-market plummet — is indeed a disaster site. Self-imposed.

Post: 'TED GETS PARTY STARTED'

The Demo-hating Murdoch rag gets it right with a good lede on the Kennedy saga that all the papers covered:

Much more interesting than the Times version.

And the Post splashes a story about actual monkey-wrenching: the sore-loser Clintons' determination to upstage Obama ("ANGER AT HILL'S DEM PARTY FOULS").

That's more of a threat to the Democrats than the GOP's attempts — if you don't count the free publicity that Rutenberg gave the Republicans.

Hillary and Bill are unlikely to even budge the needle of the grace-o-meter this week.

Post: 'FISH-KILLING INDIAN PT. RULED AN ECO-DANGER'

In actual terror news, the tab gives good play — which the Times wouldn't do for a wire-service story — to Jim Fitzgerald's AP piece:

Post: 'DRUGLORD OF MANY FACES'

Here's a gangster moniker we haven't heard before:

But the paper's most e-mailed story this morning? Some real news from Saturday:

Daily News: 'Michelle Obama: My husband shares same beliefs you have'

Oh, brother. The Denver convention's non-news gets off to a great start:

Speaking of monkey-wrenching the Dems, the following item made the home page of Google News last night: 'McCain and Jay Leno Joke About His Age'

And you wonder why news orgs all over the world clamber to land a precious spot on Google's home page for news. That frenzied pandering by news org overseers is more of a threat to journalism than the increasingly useless printing presses that papers are stuck with.

The L.A. Times is one of those huge daily ailies, but at least it proclaims in a subhead that the Dems are seriously targeting McCain's turkey neck:

Good thing that Leno's show is taped early. By the time it aired, the elderly GOP nominee's innards were struggling to digest his early-bird meal and he was probably already in bed.

Still sleepless with worry, however, were millions of other Americans. Another piece in this morning's L.A. Times:

Wrongly slapping on an anecdotal lede about a renter named Ruth Cordoba, the paper tells an interesting story once you get past that:

Good thing there aren't many low-income renters here in New York City.

Start booking those tickets to Europe. From this morning's BBC:

Bad memories for those Denver conventioneers whose last names aren't Clinton. Drizzling on the parade — Denver typically experiences showers just about every summer afternoon — is Slate's Jack Shafer:

Red alert! Red alert! And this is no joke. From the Washington Post's front page:

Don't look for this on the Times's front page.

While the Times and others talk about how the Obamas and Ted Kennedy are rousing the faithful, Drudge points to an actual faith-based story out of Denver by the AP's Eric Gorski:

As usual, the smart, sober news source that is McClatchy's web wire service gets serious about real news at the convention, reporting Monday:

Giving equal time, McClatchy also carries this important tidbit, via the Miami Herald, about an always pivotal state where GOP operative Kathleen Harris chest-bumped the Dems in 2000:

Bad news for GOP? Fla.'s Hispanic voters no longer Cuban

After the seemingly obligatory anecdotal, "human-interest" lede, Casey Woods writes:

Running down the press:

Times: 'U.S. and Poland Set Missile Deal'

Refusing to take off their Cold War monocles, Thom Shanker and Nicholas Kulish ignore the hilarity of Condi Rice going to Georgia to simmer things down. Instead, they try to get poetic on our asses:

The funniest line in this super-self-consciously serious piece:

Vice versa . . . Poland defending the U.S. . . . let's see . . . oh, yeah, maybe we could get Poland to step in on behalf of Williamsburg's Poles to try to stop Manhattan developers from wrecking the Brooklyn enclave's waterfront.

Solidarność with the hipsters!

See FAIR's fresh dissection of media blubber: "Georgia/Russia Conflict Forced Into Cold War Frame."

McClatchy: 'U.S. 'no' to intervention leaves Russia in control of Georgia'

One of the best U.S. sources of world news — and probably the liveliest — the McClatchy D.C. Bureau (the old Knight-Ridder operation) is a solid site. For the full flavor of the good reporting and breezy writing, try this from Nancy A. Youssef, Tom Lasseter, and Dave Montgomery:

Slate: 'Conventional Nonsense: Making the case for a press boycott of the national political conventions'

Jack Shafer notes the foregone conclusions of these non-events. Amen.

Post: 'HILLARY PUSHES WAY ONTO STAGE'

The tab's institutional contempt for Hillary pays off in this case, because she really did push her way onto the DNC stage. Not that this is big news. But how many more shots at Hillary does the Post have left? And she is such an easy target.

Christian Science Monitor: 'Mexican citizens asked to fight crime'

Sara Miller Llana's story notes:

The Times reports on the same story — citizens outraged that corrupt cops are even aiding and abetting kidnappings of children — but of course it takes the establishment side, not even noting Ebrard's call for a citizen corps.

Can you imagine a crew of 300,000 New Yorkers regularly keeping tabs on the NYPD? The Times sniffs, Don't even mention it. And its story sez:

No wonder that, here in NYC, the Times, with its institutionalized obeisance to authority, doesn't hold the NYPD's feet to the fire.

Post: 'TRAGIC MOM'S BABY IS SAVED'

A runaway school bus crushes pregnant NYPD traffic agent Donnette Sanz, "but a superhuman effort by 30 strangers who lifted the vehicle off her body miraculously saved her baby before she died."

Word pictures of the bus driver with his head in his hands — ""The light turned red, and I couldn't stop . . . I tried to miss her. I tried to go behind her, but she stopped and moved back, and I hit her."

Oh, by the way, we find out only at the end of this weeper that the 72-year-old driver hasn't had a license in 40 years and that his record includes "a gun bust and arrests for driving on a suspended license, grand larceny, menacing and aggravated harassment."

And he was driving a school bus — a school bus!

Most absurd quote of the day:

The Daily News account is lamer, but it does include this quote from Bloomberg:

Give Bloomberg a break. George W. Bush couldn't have connected those dots.

Post: ' "WRONG MAN" FREED AFTER 14 YRS.: BAILED OUT ON "BAD RAP" IN QNS. SLAY'

Great quote garnered by Ikimulisa Livingston:

Times: 'Bomber Kills 18 on Shiite Pilgrimage in Iraq'

Obsessed with Georgia, the Times editors are now consigning Iraq news to a roundup — you know, like those small-town-newspaper city council stories that always include "in other business" items.

Today's example is yet another suicide bombing. In other business, the Times adds:

Only two other brief grafs, both far down the story, about this abuse. No mention of exactly what kind of abuse is alleged or that Camp Bucca is the largest U.S. prison in Iraq, housing a staggering 18,000 Iraqis, probably none of whom have been to trial.

At least the BBC saw fit to present a separate story on this.

But the U.S. establishment press has consistently underplayed jail abuse, except when it reaches the high embarrassment level of Abu Ghraib. Remember the proud "Murderous Maniacs" at Camp Mercury near Fallujah, the U.S. soldiers who beat up prisoners for sport? If you don't, see yesterday's Daily Flog.

Post: 'TRAP PLAY TARGETS GIANTS; "SEX-TORTION PLOT" VS. COACH COUGHLIN'

Stop right there, unless you want to walk around all day with images swirling in your brain of this aging coach naked and having sex.

Post: 'DEM'S KILLER WENT "POST-IT" '

Hed of the day, lovingly applied to a wire story:

Wall Street Journal: 'World Economy Shows New Strain'

If you can tear yourself away from Olympic water polo for a second, remember that China is losing the gold-medal battle but is raking in the gold anyway.

The WSJ reports, in other business:

The Journal almost always leavens its dense reporting with a human touch (not on its inhumane editorial pages, but in news stories), and even this piece has a good morsel:

Wall Street Journal: 'Data Raise Questions On Role of Speculators'

Suspicions confirmed: The oil market is being driven by scumbag speculators, not the "free market." The WSJ puts it into perspective:

This is a fascinating developing story — let alone a probable explanation of why gas costs so much — if only the rest of the press would take the topic seriously.

Here's the politics of it:

Running down the press:

Post: 'ROCKE-FAUX-LER WED JUST TO GET GREEN CARD'

We've entered the rococo phase of headline-writing about Clark Rockefeller. More importantly, this guy is really in Deutsch now. Waste your time on the Post story if you want, but for details of the creepy murder case that may involve this weak-chinned schnook, go back to yesterday afternoon's Post or to this morning's mundane AP story: "LA authorities: 'Rockefeller' is wanted German."

Better still, see this morning's BBC story, "Child-snatch suspect is 'wanted.' "

Daily News: 'Enquire-ing minds want to know who fed Edwards tips'

A non-story about a semi-non-story. Let yourself go, if you want. It's slightly less unhealthy than a pint of Ben & Jerry's.

Daily News: 'Fiends armed with badge of shame'

Good story from cops reporter Alison Gendar:

Los Angeles Times: 'Michael Phelps' victory dance is innate, scientists say'

The best Olympics piece so far:

Newsday: 'A reminder of New York's GOP convention 4 years ago'

Weak headline, good story that actually applies historical context to a current event. More of a reminder than a scoop. Apparently unafraid to piss off those big bad NYPD officials, Rocco Parascandola plucks this one back from the memory hole:

Times: 'Police Want Tight Security Zone at Ground Zero'

Via Charles V. Bagli's story:

Disheartening, but is anybody really surprised by this?

Even if there had never been a 9/11, Mayor Mike Bloomberg, who purchased the mayoral job, would support making this gloriously disordered city a gated community. And the NYPD, the most massive and powerful police bureaucracy in the country, loves the idea of hiring more troops for these security zones.

Everybody's happy.

By the way, Bloomberg adds, put out that cigarette.

New Yorker: 'Changing Lanes'

Elizabeth Kolbert's piece blasts McCain for swerving away from integrity. That's not such a big deal for any candidate, but her story's intriguing because it defends high gas prices. An excerpt:

Slate: 'The Afterlife for Scientologists: What will happen to Isaac Hayes' legendary soul?'

Nina Shen Rastogi's "Explainer" confirms that, according to Scientology officials, Chef's soul will be "born again into the flesh of another body."

Dibs!

NY Observer: 'What's Doctoroff Saying to City? It's a Secret'

Nice dig by Eliot Brown on his attempted dig for info:

NY Observer: 'Rangel on Immigration, Bad Guys'

Azi Paybarah points out a Charlie Rangel video performance in which the vet congressman does some shrewd truth-telling:

Times: 'Cost-Cutting in New York and London, a Boom in India'

Heather Timmons's story notes:

Yeah, it's a "food chain." Ridiculously overused metaphor, but interesting story for what it accidentally reveals about corporate jargon and, more importantly, what passes for "entry-level" jobs on Wall Street:

B-school grads stepping into six-figure jobs. You don't have to be a radical to note with grim humor the astounding inequity of wages on Wall Street for bullshit money-moving jobs vs. wages for the rest of us around the country who do more vital work (myself not included).

If Wall Street is smart (and recent events don't support that), it will start pouring more money into the McCain campaign, because there's no doubt that Barack Obama is less sympathetic to those six-figure B-school grads and more in tune with the rest of us.

Whether Obama would actually do anything about this inequity is another matter altogether, but there would be zero chance of such change under McCain.

Los Angeles Times: 'Kuwait royal family member sentenced to death'

The story about royal drug trafficker Talal Nasser al Sabah, now sentenced to death, notes:

In other words, if he's executed, it will be a step toward democracy. Only in the Middle East — and the U.S.

Actually, the best move for this guy would be to flee to the U.S. Yes, we have the death penalty, but George W. Bush could add him to his list of pardons for the end of his term.

You can be sure that this president, despite his having been the hangingest governor in U.S. history, will have an extremely interesting list of pardons. That list probably includes convicted spy-for-Israel Jonathan Pollard and a host of financiopathological miscreants.

Wall Street Journal: 'McCain Bristles Over Russia's "Aggression" '

Careful, old guy, don't get yourself aggravated. The Journal — worth the piddling online-subscription money for its superior news stories and analyses — recognizes that McCain's bluster, which it calls "an increasingly hard line against Russia over its military operations in Georgia," is a ploy to separate himself from Obama by focusing on foreign policy.

But it also points out that McCain has always been a hardliner:

Shrewd strategy. This provides an out for white voters in thrall to the Mandingo Complex but unwilling to say it aloud: They can tell themselves that it's not a racial thing, that they really do prefer McCain because of his foreign-policy stances — ignoring his bellicose stance on the Iraq Debacle, with which they don't agree.

They can tell themselves that McCain has much more foreign policy experience, even though most of his experience was as a prisoner of war.

White voters can't say it's race — that would be impolite or it would be speaking ill of themselves. (For more on that, see what I pointed out yesterday: New York magazine's package on the color-coded campaign.)

Some of this internal thought process is conscious; some of it takes place in the subconscious. Whatever the case, this presidential race is about race. Bear with me while I remind you of this about a thousand more times before November.

Running down the press:

Daily News: 'Lennon killer gets wife time in Attica'

Best lede of the day on the most fascinating sex story of the day:

The Daily News also has the most laughable sex story of the day (see below for a rundown of Mike Lupica).

Daily News: '7 train riders dodge bullet from gun toss'

The Daily News also has the scariest story of the day:

Times: 'Isaac Hayes, 65, a Creator of ’70s Soul Style, Dies'

Always wait for the Times's usually stilted official obits. This one, however, is relatively loose, mentioning Hayes's "lascivious bass-baritone" and his sojourn in South Park that was cut short by the singer's Scientology obsession.

Kudos to the Times for running a photo of Chef with Stan and Kyle. But where's Cartman?

Post: Page Six's Sightings.

A riveting tidbit:

But where's "Russians packing heat in Georgian hot spot"?

Times: 'Russians Push Past Separatist Area to Assault Central Georgia'

The Russians bombed Tbilisi, so why not say "bomb Georgia capital"?

Don't fool around with the U.S. press. Go straight to sites like Eurasianet and the Armenia-based Caucasian Knot, where you can read Georgian bloggers.

But peace is on the way: The Bush administration says it will seek a U.N. resolution condemning Russia's actions. Here's George W. Bush over the weekend:

No doubt the world will take seriously this condemnation by Bush of unjustified invasions.

Post: 'HOW DARE THAT BRAZEN FLOOZY!'

Thankfully, an unpretentious story about the Edwards scandal. Dan Mangan's lede:

Daily News: 'Touchy-feely Rielle trashes Elizabeth'

More sifting through Newsweek's breathlessly headlined weekend scoop of glitter litter ('What Rielle Hunter Told Me').

Daily News: 'John Edwards is a liar and cheat who has mastered the sleazy art of hypocrisy'

Not just hypocrisy but sleazy hypocrisy — the worst kind, apparently.

This tsk-tskiest piece is sports columnist Mike Lupica's hysterical rant about pols screwing other women.

Surprised that Lupica didn't rag on Woody-Allen-like Grover Cleveland, who entered the White House as a bachelor and then entered the daughter of his good friend Oscar Folsom — a girl whose upbringing he had supervised — and wound up marrying her in the White House. It was the best sex-related event in the White House until Marilyn Monroe's sleepovers with JFK.

Cleveland even admitted fathering an illegitimate child — astonishingly, the brief bio of Cleveland on the site of his birthplace museum in Caldwell, New Jersey, freely admits it, saying in its entirety:

Edwards, like fellow wick-dippers Pier Paolo Pasolini and Bill Clinton, has never been much of a hidebound moralist about other people's sex lives, at least not compared with sex hypocrites such as David Vitter, Larry Craig, Roy Cohn, Billy James Hargis, Ted Haggard, Jim Bakker, J. Edgar Hoover . . . too many images of pols' genitals, so I'm stopping now.

Lupica excoriated Edwards for mentioning that his screwing around with Rielle happened during his wife's cancer fight. But read the BBC's Saturday story, which includes this from Elizabeth Edwards:

Making fun of a pol who does this is appropriate behavior. But at least Edwards, unlike Larry Craig, Eliot Spitzer, and many other pols caught in sex scandals, didn't make his wife sit beside him as he answered questions on TV.

Post: 'Lesbo Lap Dance'

At last look, the Post's sixth most popular story — the kind men like.

Wall Street Journal: 'Mortgage-Market Trouble Reaches Big Credit Unions'

An unpopular story of the kind that nobody will like and which is extremely important to your present and future:

Slate: 'China Beats the United States'

No, not the Olympics, but the clever hed on Matthew Yeomans's roundup of business news. His lede is even better:

Daily News: 'UPPER EAST $IDE IS TOPS FOR ALL POLS'

Ooh! Breaking news lede this morning by Daphne Retter:

I wrote the same thing four years ago in "The Best Votes Money Can Buy," in which I analyzed the top 50 ZIP codes and noted:

Give it to Retter, even though her real news doesn't start until the fourth graf:

Post: 'SHOCKING POWER SCAM JOLT$ NY CONSUMERS'

Predictable hed on Bill Sanderson's important, though unsurprising, story:

Get pissed about this, not about Edwards.

Running down the press:

Washington Post: 'Bin Laden Driver Gets 5½ Years; U.S. Sought 30'

Don't even bother with William Glaberson's weak and watery New York Times story. The WashPost's Jerry Markon and Josh White tell it like it is: a "stunning rebuke to prosecutors."

The only thing that seems out of whack about Salim Hamdan's sentence is that his 5½ -year term is shorter than the eight years we're serving as punk bitches under Bush and Cheney.

Is that fair? Give the guy a couple of more years.

In any case, one of many reasons that the WashPost story is superior — smooth, organized writing is another — is this passage, which can only be inferred from slogging through the stiff, cautious Times piece:

For legal beagles, see Jurist for background links.

New York Observer: 'Does McCain Have a Chance in an Election About the Economy?'

Wrong-headed stuff from Jennifer Rubin:

The story's so careful to be color-blind when we know that America isn't so let's not act as if it were.

America still has a Negro in the woodpile. If Obama were white, he'd be crushing McCain right now.

This year's presidential race? It's the race, stupid.

Post: 'FAVRE STRESSES 4-WARD THINKING: VET EAGER TO GET TO WORK AS CLOCK TICKS'

C'mon, headline writers, get it together. That's almost as lame as today's hed in the Green Bay Press-Gazette: "Packers, Favre begin a new era."

Be thankful that you're not stuck in Green Bay, where the cheese is redolent but the sportswriting stinks:

Close the gates. Favre's the last immigrant from Green Bay allowed in our city.

Post: ' "HOLY" WAR OVER GOV GAY-MARRIAGE RULING'

I'm serious about closing the gates. We've got a bunch of religious nuts out there trying to bust up our gay pals' wedding plans:

Post: 'FEEDING A KILLER APPETITE: B'KLYN THUG COPS PLEA FOR JUNK-FOOD FEAST'

See the mug. The guy doesn't look chewish.

Post: 'MCCAIN'S GROCERY LIST VS. BARACK'

I detect a theme here.

Slate: 'On the Front Lines of the Global Food Crisis'

More food for thought: Up close and personal, a Punjab to the stomach.

Los Angeles Times: 'The New York bodega fights for its life'

Now I'm sure there's a theme.

Just yesterday (see the 8/7 Daily Flog), the New York Times told us about the rich snoots' crisis of not being able to drink at their high-priced places.

For the rest of us, Erika Hayasaki steps all the way back to California this morning to put perspective on our bodega crisis:

Guardian (U.K.): 'Georgia and Russia edge towards war over South Ossetia'

Cold Warriors are creaming in their jeans because someone is finally bombing Stalin's hometown. And it's Russia that's doing it!

This is some serious stuff going on the Caucasus, and naturally it's mostly ignored by the U.S. press, though the Times does report: "Fiercest Fighting in Years Near Georgian Border."

You want to know what's going on, this is from the Guardian:

Slate: 'Broken Windows: Farhad Manjoo takes readers' questions about Microsoft's sly new PR campaign for Vista.'

The daily newsprint press ignores at its own peril this kind of hybrid reporting on important topics.

What if you were forced to buy an SUV right now? That's what Bill Gates is trying to make you do by shoving Vista onto your mother-friggin'-board.

This Slate item is 21st century consumer news.

Slate: 'The Anthrax Truth Movement: The Web searches for holes in the FBI's latest lone-gunman theory'

Farhad Manjoo (yes, him again) calls it right:

Daily News: 'The 10 loudest political statements in Olympics history'

Mildly interesting after this intriguing David Hinckley lede:

New York Review of Books: 'China: Humiliation & the Olympics'

You want to try to understand China? No, let me put it another way, as a direct order: You want to try to understand China.

That's for the sake of your future and your children's future in a world in which China's burgeoning consumer class is elbowing the U.S. consumer class out of the way.

Avert your eyes from the glare of endless promos, ads, and Olympics coverage and read Orville Schell's piece.

And speaking of food, check out Schell's Modern Meat, his 1984 exposé of factory farming. You'll have to search out a printed copy. But that's OK. It's better to wait until after lunch to read this brilliant reporting on the meatpacking industry.

Running down the press:

Post: 'IDIOT SI SIBS PROVE 'GUIDO' MAYOR RIGHT: COPS'

Attention, immigrants: If you can prove that you understand this headline, you pass the New York City citizenship test. If you need help, here's Kyle Murphy's lede:

Times: 'As Iraq Surplus Rises, Little Goes Into Rebuilding'

Based on a GAO report spurred by indefatigable Michigan senator Carl Levin, James Glanz and Campbell Robertson write:

As if that weren't enough:

Too bad the Times is so hidebound, parochial, and old-school newspaperish that it won't include a link to the National Priorities Project's Cost of War page, which breaks down the tab to U.S. taxpayers at $341.4 million a day and the running total, as I write, as $543,045,201,657. Oops, make that $543,045,394,187.

Those damn Iraqis. We oughta just invade their country.

Daily News: 'Doped-up teen kills couple in Queens wreck: cops'

Bullshit.

The lede sez:

Actually, the kid wasn't "doped-up" enough, but the story doesn't reveal that until the 11th graf:

Marijuana caused this tragedy? If he'd smoked another blunt, he probably wouldn't have been able to even get into the car.

Times: 'Town in China Returns to Normal a Day After a Bold Attack'

Yeah, "normal." Edward Wong's folo on Monday's violence in far-western China ignores recent and ongoing history. The U.S. press swallows the propaganda of China's rulers and calls this "terrorism," but that depends on how you look at it.

China's government is pushing its dominant Han Chinese into historically Uighur territory. So this is like calling the American Indians "terrorists" when the U.S. government encouraged white settlers to push West in the first three centuries of our country's existence. Terror is terror; it's frightening and disgusting. "Terrorist" depends on your point of reference.

There are millions of Uighurs, so what's "normal" for this huge occupied area? The world's most self-prestigious paper needed to background this piece at least a little for its readers' sake. And when the Times doesn't do this, then most of the rest of the lapdog U.S. press, which take their cue from the Times, doesn't bother to do it either, which is why we need to keep ragging on the paper to do its job. And the paper could have done it by checking other mainstream-journo sources and throwing in a paragraph.

For instance, see Terry McCarthy's 1997 story on Time mag's website and from one paragraph you may understand why there was such a brutal attack yesterday in you-never-heard-of-before Kashgar:

For some great right-now photos of China's Far West turbulence, go to The Opposite End of China.

Times: 'Texas Executes Mexican Despite Objections'

You don't have to be a foe of the death penalty to throw this context into the story — which the Times didn't:

Of the top five bloodthirsty countries in the world, the U.S. is fifth and last. And that's the end of the good news from the humaneness perspective. The four other countries are (in order of state-sanctioned bloodthirstiness) China, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan.

Note that, of the top five, the U.S. is the only Western country, the only one close to being a democracy, the only "Christian nation," and the country with the most Toyota-sales-event TV ads.

Post: ' 'THRAX DOC'S KIDS FACED FBI'S HEAT'

There was really no reason to abbreviate "anthrax," but somehow it's just right for this hed. Chuck Bennett's ripped-from-a-'40s-teletype lede:

Times: 'Where the Race Now Begins at Kindergarten'

Winnie Hu reports on a really sad story for really small kids who belong to a really tiny percentage of New York's population that can afford non-parochial private schooling:

Thank God the city's public schools are in great shape, as my colleague Nat Hentoff points out.

Post: 'ONE MORE SHOT AT GOTTI: FEDS TRY TO NAIL "JUNIOR" AGAIN BY CHARGING MOB SON WITH 3 SLAYS, COKE DEALING'

"Whacked" is such a cool word. It's sure to outlive the fading era of the Italian-American gangsters.

That's not personal, Sonny. It's strictly word business.

Times: 'Guantánamo Bay Judge Admits Possible Error'

Wait a minute. You mean the "international law of war" is even supposed to be "applied"? Have you checked with George W. Bush's handlers? Or with Alberto Gonzales?

Post: 'PAPERS BARE SOARES' LOVEFEST WITH SPITZER'

Misleading use of the word "lovefest," which has come to mean only one thing in the Spitzer sex lexicon — unless the ex-governor has a previously unrevealed kink involving "kid gloves":

Slate: 'When "Skinny" Means "Black": The weirdest new criticism of Obama' Tim Noah's piece isn't a P.C. piece; it's about a Wall Street Journal may-or-may-not-have-been-a hit piece:

Even though Noah neglected to mention Fat Albert or Biggie Smalls, it's still interesting.

Times: 'Accusations of Sex Abuse Trail Doctor'

Leslie Kaufman gingerly backs into this explosive tale of celebrity pediatrician Melvin D. Levine's having faced years of sexual-abuse allegations. You have to wait until the middle of the sixth graf to read this:

Yes, we can't imagine highly respected people such as doctors or priests behaving in such a criminal way and then being defended by their defenders.